I have lived on this shelf

so long

the room has entered me.

Dust, light, seasons.

The slow rearrangement

of a life.

From here,

I have watched its small devotions:

folded clothes,

scattered pencils,

pet hair lifted from the carpet

like pale evidence of love,

books opened wide,

books left face-down,

pages written on

as if words might hold

the dark at bay.

I have watched your hands

move through the rituals

that make a life:

drawing,

brushing,

studying,

dressing,

writing,

waiting,

beginning again.

I have watched you put on a face

for the day—

not false,

just carefully assembled.

A steadier mouth.

A body returned to itself.

A version of you

the world could safely touch.

I have watched your daughter

come to you for comfort.

I have watched you cry.

I have watched the dog

press its holy body against your grief

as if that, too,

were a kind of prayer.

I have watched the cat

empty drawers with the confidence

of the deeply adored,

disturb the neat piles,

make a kingdom

of whatever was soft enough

to hold her.

I have stood beside your dreams

and your nightmares both.

Seen sleep soften.

Seen it turn sharp.

Seen the body remember

what daylight could not soothe.

And still, morning comes.

Quiet blue at the window.

Hair brushed.

Curtains opened.

A drawer shut.

A book lifted.

A pen uncapped.

The dog curled close.

The stubborn pulse

of a life continuing.

From here I have learned

that hope is not grand.

It is folded laundry.

A lamp switched on.

A chapter started.

A body getting dressed

despite itself.

A room that keeps receiving you

night after night

without asking

who you managed to be elsewhere.

It lives beside sadness.

In the weight of an animal asleep near you.

In your daughter’s trust.

In your hands still making things.

In the fact that grief, too,

must make room

for blankets,

for reading,

for one more morning.

I have watched you live here

through heartbreak,

through quiet recovery,

through all the ordinary acts

that do not look like miracles

until you survive by them.

It was never nothing.

It was a life—

worn, interrupted,

warm in places,

lit from within.

And from my shelf,

that has always seemed enough.